CardSpike is an online poker and casino portal that has been consistently delaying payments to affiliates, players and other service providers since its inception in September 2008. The affiliates in particular have been desperately trying to get CardSpike declared a rogue poker room by the Casino Affiliate Programs (CAP) and the Poker Affiliate Program (PAP).
CAP and PAP are watch dog organizations founded to protect the interest of the affiliates who drive traffic to online poker rooms and casinos. However they refused to declare CardSpike a rogue portal. This angered the poker affiliates of the CardSpike poker room who went on a vitriolic rampage at practically every poker forum. Then news broke that CAP has an ownership interest in CardSpike and therefore was not taking requisite action against the erring poker room. While this story was simmering beneath the surface new salvos have been fired at CAP.
The first comes from none other than Bryan Bailey the Casinomeister. Casinomeister is one of the most reputed watch dogs of the online gambling industry. In a caustic statement posted on YouTube, Bailey lashed out at CAP. The video is titled “Chillin’ with the Meister”. Bailey said that he will be giving the CAP event in London a miss and went on to state the reasons.
One reason is that CAP monopolizes the affiliate conferences, implying that they speak but do not listen. The second reason is however the real one. Because of CAP’s conflict of interest in the CardSpike imbroglio, its image as a watch dog organization stands tarnished. Bailey obviously does not want to tarnish the reputation Casinomeister has earned as a watch dog by associating with tainted watch dogs.
With the pressure mounting on CAP its co-founder Lou Fabiono tendered his resignation. Since Fabiono is the whole and the soul of CAP no one really knew what this meant. Then the second salvo was fired. Jeremy Enke, from Poker Affiliates Listing (PAL), accused Fabiono and the other co-founder of CAP, Warren Jolly of hacking into his account. Enke co-hosts Affiliate Life Radio, the weekly show that focuses on overall poker affiliate strategy with special guests and callers.
Enke traced the trail of attempts to log into his PAL account and it led to the account of Fabiono and Jolly at Affiliate Media. Affiliate Media operates the CAP and PAP forums. Enke also revealed that Fabiono used to hack into his account while he used to work at PAP. No possible reason has been given for this latest development, but one thing is sure. The watch dog is slowly turning out to be a rogue.
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